In Hallmark holiday movies, the shopping scenes always have the same vibe: Cute, cozy, outdoorsy with lots of places for characters to get toasty. There’s rarely a mall, seldom a big box store and almost never a tablet screen for the shopping center.
Luckily, we can find that in real-life.
Welcome to the holiday market set up, a concept that’s taken on a myriad of interpretations. Across the Bay State, you’ll find all kinds of great holiday markets, from seaside and quaint to bustling in the big city.
They all share this in common: You’ll not only find your Hallmark holiday shopping bliss, you’ll find unique gifts as well. Consider these options, a few of the many holiday markets out there this season.
Harvard Square Holiday Fair: A tradition since 1986, the Harvard Square Holiday Fair (https://www.harvardsquareholidayfair.com/) takes place this year Dec. 15-17 and Dec. 21-23.
Java junkies rejoice as Blank Street Coffee opens up shop in Harvard Square in Cambridge, its fourth location in Boston after entering the area in August 2022.
Similar to past Boston openings, Blank Street Harvard Square on 1380 Massachusetts Avenue will offer baked goods from Salem-based A&J King, as well as offering $2 drinks for the first two days of opening starting Thursday, Nov. 16.
“Boston has welcomed us with open arms since we opened our first store in the area last August, and we are excited to continue growing our presence with our new location at Harvard Square,” Vinay Menda, Blank Street’s co-founder, told the Daily Voice. “We can’t wait to immerse ourselves in the Harvard community and bring Blank Street to students, faculty and locals!”
College students will also be happy to know that Blank Street has a Regulars program, the store’s loyalty program that offers a subscription to get free drinks or at a reduced price.
Some of the coffee drinks available on opening day include:
A coffee chain that’s grown in just three years from a small cart in New York to dozens of locations including Boston is expanding to a place known for cultivating a number of startups itself.
Arrow Street Arts announces March 2024 launch festival celebrating the official opening of its Harvard Square venue.
Arrow Street Arts, Inc. (ASA), a Cambridge, MA-based non-profit, announces the official opening of its new venue in Harvard Square with a week-long Launch Festival in late March 2024. Produced by Cambridge-based Liars and Believers (LaB) led by executive producer Georgia Lyman and artistic director Jason Slavick, the festival will offer a wide variety of performances, events, and community gatherings celebrating the vibrant diversity of the Greater Boston performing arts community. ASA’s Launch Festival marks the beginning of the venue’s inaugural year of activity, with the facility beginning regular operations on April 1, 2024.
Arrow Street Arts, founded by David Altshuler, a long-time Cambridge resident and arts advocate, reflects the vision that “Art Creates Community and Community Creates Belonging.” A multi-space performance and event facility, the venue hosted a mid-construction, soft-opening activation of its main theater with Moonbox Productions’ presentation of Sweeney Todd that just completed a successful four-week run. ASA’s street-front Studio will be activated as a rehearsal, class, and small presentation space in early December 2023. Final renovations to the building and installation of seating and theatrical systems will be completed this winter before the full opening.
ASA and Liars and Believers will launch an open call to performing artists later this month with the goal of assembling a varied range of performances and genres to occur during the opening festival. These performing artists will be selected by a jury panel assembled by LaB’s Executive Producer Georgia Lyman, and the opening programming will include these artists alongside a group of curated performances and a special performance by Liars and Believers. If selected, artists will receive a compensation package to produce their works. Selected artists will be notified in January 2024, and more information about the programming of the opening festival will be announced shortly thereafter.
More information on guidelines and submitting an application for festival performers is available at https://arrowstarts.org/launch
New Fund at Cambridge Community Foundation Expands Access to ASA Spaces
In addition to its revitalization of the two performance spaces, Arrow Street Arts has partnered with the Cambridge Community Foundation (CCF) to increase equitable access to the performance spaces for artists and arts organizations who wish to present their work at ASA’s venues. The foundation of and for all of Cambridge, CCF aspires to make the community vibrant, just, and equitable for all, today and into the future.
ASA founder David Altshuler says, “We are thrilled to kick off our inaugural year of programming in our new performance spaces with our opening Launch Festival. We know partnering with Georgia and Jason and Liars and Believers will be a fantastic collaboration to bring in dynamic performing artists who will utilize the spaces to their fullest capacity. Through our relationship with the Cambridge Community Foundation, we can’t wait to welcome a wide array of local artists and creators. This festival will further promote Cambridge as an artistic hub.”
“Through our partnership with Arrow Street Arts, we hope to increase access, particularly for artists from historically underserved and diverse backgrounds, to affordable and welcoming arts spaces in Cambridge,” said Christina Turner, director of programs and grantmaking at CCF. “This fund is one piece in the Foundation’s commitment to strengthening the creative capacity of arts and culture in Cambridge now and into the future.”
Informed by the region’s well-documented need for accessible rehearsal and performance spaces, most notably in the Boston Performing Arts Facilities Assessment and Cambridge’s Mayor’s Arts Task Force Report, Arrow Street Arts addresses the pressing need of small to mid-size organizations and individual artists for spaces accommodating audiences ranging from 150-600. Outfitted with comprehensive lighting, sound, and production capacities, ASA’s facility offers both venues and production services that will help meet community and artists’ needs.
Locally focused and artist-centric, Arrow Street Arts is committed to being a learning organization, exploring issues of affordability, access, equity, and sustainability and increasing the resources available to artists and community organizations, such as the Arrow Street Arts Fund at the Cambridge Community Foundation.
Founded by David Altshuler, with renovations planned by Charles Rose Architects, the 11,500 square-foot Arrow Street facility will be revitalized with extensive production enhancements to two flexible performance spaces and other upgrades that will enhance both the audience and artist experiences. A 4,500 square-foot black box theater will offer various seating configurations for up to approximately 300 audience members, and a new 1,100 square-foot street-front studio will offer a more intimate venue for smaller presentations and events as well as rehearsals and classes. Both multi-use spaces will support projects across a range of artistic genres, including theater, spoken word/readings, dance, music, and film.
Saint Paul’s Choir School (SPCS) presents “Christmas in Harvard Square,” a concert of festive seasonal Christmas music, on Sundays, December 10 and 17, 3 pm, at St. Paul’s Parish, 29 Mount Auburn St., Cambridge. SPCS’s Boys’ Choir, perform together with the Schola of St. Paul’s, Back Bay Brass, and instrumental accompaniment, including percussion, harp, and organ. The program includes many traditional favorites, including SPCS Founder Theodore Marier’s beloved setting of “Silent Night,” musical selections from the 10th through 21st centuries, including a plainsong “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” and the Nigerian carol “Betelehemu.” General, reserved, and premium seating tickets range from $35 to $70, available at christmasinharvardsquare.com.
“Christmas in Harvard Square,” features a delightful mix of traditional and contemporary music of composers Benjamin Britten, Franz Biebl, Herbert Howells, Theodore Marier, among others. Audiences return yearly to this joyful celebration of the Christmas season, a beloved annual tradition, sung by one of the few boy choirs in the United States. Attendees enjoy the rare opportunity to hear the boy choristers perform in concert, offering a program that transcends their weekly Mass duties and worship services at St. Paul’s Parish.
SPCS Interim Director of Music Richard Webster leads the ensemble, together with Associate Music Director Brandon Straub. Webster brings an impressive five decades of experience to his appointment for the 2023-24 academic year, previously serving as director of music and as organist at Trinity Church in Copley Square for 17 years, and 29 years as organist and choirmaster at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Evanston, Illinois, where he directed its Choir of Men and Boys and the Girls Choir to much acclaim.
“I’ve held only three jobs in my life, and this, in the best way, is by far the most challenging,” says Webster, a nod to his appointment at St. Paul’s Choir School. “To serve a school that’s very serious about music means that I still have the privilege of growing and learning myself.”
St. Paul’s Choir School is the only all-boys Catholic choir school in the United States, sustaining longtime collaborations with Boston Symphony Orchestra, Boston Lyric Opera, Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Boston Pops Orchestra.
“Christmas in Harvard Square is a unique twist on what you would normally hear at St. Paul’s. This is not Mass, it’s not Vespers, it’s a concert of traditional sacred music, and music that’s not at all traditional. It offers multicultural works, several helming from faraway places,” explains Webster.
Those attending the concert also have the chance to join the choir in singing the traditional favorite carols “Hark the Herald Angels Sing,” “Once in Royal David’s City,” “Angels We Have Heard on High,” and “Come All Ye Faithful.” This traditional concert experience is enriched by St. Paul’s outstanding acoustic, which Webster touts as “one of the best in the Boston area.”
To learn more about “Christmas in Harvard Square,” or to order tickets, visit christmasinharvardsquare.com. To learn about Saint Paul’s Choir School’s enrollment, curriculum, programs and performances, visit saintpaulschoirschool.us, call 617-868-8658, or follow St. Paul’s Choir School Harvard Square on social media.
A Clover Food Lab location in Harvard Square in Cambridge.
The Boston-area healthy-eating chain Clover Food Lab has filed for bankruptcy protection, with its CEO describing troubles stemming from the pandemic and the lending environment following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank.
A growing group of coffee shops and coffee carts based in New York City will soon be opening a fourth outlet in the local area, nearly a year after it was first announced.
According to a press release, Blank Street Coffee is slated to open in Cambridge on November 16, moving into a space on Mass. Ave. in Harvard Square that had previously been home to a location of Starbucks. The new location will join others locally on Boylston Street in the Back Bay, Charles Street in Beacon Hill, and Cambridge Street also in Beacon Hill, along with others in Manhattan, Brooklyn (where it started out), and elsewhere.
The address for the new location of Blank Street Coffee in Harvard Square is 1380 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA, 02138. The website for the business can be found at https://www.blankstreet.com/
Wordsworth bookstore owner Hillel Stavis with wife Donna Friedman on the day the store closed after 28 years as a Harvard Sq. landmark.
For Hillel Stavis, who first sold books part time as a high school student, there was something almost spiritual about spending time in a sanctuary of book-lined shelves.
“That reverential moment when somebody walks into a bookstore,” he told the Globe in 1997, “is a different kind of experience from entering a clothing store or supermarket.”
When he launched his own bookstore, though, he had his feet firmly planted on the ground — on sidewalks, to be precise. Scouting Greater Boston locations and calculating foot traffic, he settled on Harvard Square, where he opened WordsWorth Books on Brattle Street in 1976. Even though the neighborhood already had bookshops, he saw it was full of readers walking with books in hand.
The festival will feature performances by Le Vent du Nord and other artists across venues in Cambridge and Somerville, MA.
The 21st annual Boston Celtic Music Festival will return to Club Passim and Harvard Square, with added venues like the Crystal Ballroom, The Burren, and The Rockwell on January 11-14, 2024. The festival will showcase Greater Boston’s deep tradition of music, song, and dance from Irish, Scottish, Cape Breton, and other Celtic communities. BCMFest features traditional acts and others that draw on contemporary sounds and ideas, full-time, professional touring acts, and local session musicians, highlighting performers from across the generations. Tickets are on sale now at passim.org/bcmfest.
This year, the festival will include the award-winning and highly acclaimed Québec band Le Vent du Nord, performing at the Nightcap Finale on Saturday, January 13 at the Crystal Ballroom. The group’s vast repertoire draws from both traditional sources and original compositions. At the same time, their highly rhythmic and soulful music, rooted in the Celtic diaspora, is enhanced with a broad range of global influences.
Among the acts confirmed to perform are: Joey Abarta, Jenna Moynihan, Neil Pearlman & the Wallbreakers, Mariel Vandersteel, Casey Murray & Molly Tucker, Triga, Cape Breton, Highland Dance Boston, Ramblxr, Boston Scottish Fiddle Orchestra, Scottish Fish, Pine Tree Flyers, Firefly Landing, Eight Feet Tall, Isabel Oliart and Friends, The Carroll Sisters with Sammy Wetstein, Elias Cardoso, Medford All-Star Ceili Band, Jinty Mcgrath, Calico, Erin Hogan & Jimmy Kelly, No Seconds, Emma Azelborn, Elizabeth and Ben Anderson, Sarah Ann Hajjar, and Sarah Collins & Jonathan Vocke.
“Considered to be the epicenter of Celtic music in America, Boston has maintained its historical reputation of being home to some of the most prolific Celtic musicians in the country. The Boston Celtic Music Festival represents the heart of our vibrant local Celtic music scene,” said Summer McCall, BCMFest Director. “This year we’re delighted to be at both our home venue of Club Passim in Harvard Square, and to be expanding into Davis Square for Friday night and Saturday day and night at the Crystal Ballroom at Somerville Theatre, The Burren, and The Rockwell.”
Festival highlights include:
The First Round concert on Thursday, January 11, at 7pm provides a night of the more traditional sounds of Celtic music in Boston. This evening’s concert will take place at Club Passim with performances from Joey Abarta, Jenna Moynihan, and Neil Pearlman & The Wallbreakers.
Friday, January 12 at 7pm is the Roots and Branches Concert. Guests can experience the dynamic sounds and diverse styles of Boston’s Celtic music community, with music from Mariel Vandersteel, Triga, and Casey Murray & Molly Tucker.
BCMFest: Boston Urban Ceilidh will occur on Friday, January 12 at 7:30pm at the Crystal Ballroom. The night will feature participatory and social dances from the Cape Breton and Scottish traditions, all with live music.
BCMFest: Dayfest offers over six hours of entertainment from mid-morning until 5 pm on Saturday, January 13. All events will occur in Davis Sq. in Somerville at The Crystal Ballroom, The Burren, and The Rockwell.
BCMFest: Nightcap with Le Vent Du Nord – Capping BCMFest 2024 on Saturday, January 13, at 8pm at the Crystal Ballroom will be a performance by the award-winning and highly acclaimed band Le Vent du Nord.
Enjoy some fine food in a relaxed live Celtic music atmosphere on Sunday, January 14, at the BCMFest Brunch at Club Passim from 10am – 2pm.
Festival performers will lead workshops on Sunday, January 14, at the Passim School of Music at 26 Church Street in Harvard Sq. More details are coming soon.
BCMFest takes place from January 11-14. All festival details including performances, times, and locations are available at passim.org/bcmfest.
Fresh slices of pepperoni and cheese pizza at Joe’s Pizza. ERIN CLARK/GLOBE STAFF
Where to: Joe’s Pizza in Harvard Square.
Why: For a real New York slice, served until 3 a.m.
The backstory: In the late 1950s, Joe Pozzuoli came to the United States from Naples. He’d learned how to make pizza growing up in Italy, and eventually he opened the first Joe’s in Greenwich Village in 1975 at the corner of Bleecker and Carmine, back when the neighborhood still had the whiff of anti-establishment grit, and where everyone knew his name. It felt and operated like a dive bar, dark and simple, with late-night hours and zero frills.
